Temple of Behbeit el-Hagar
Since the earliest days of the Egyptian people, they had built special houses in which to worship their God. From mud and reed huts, to mudbrick buildings, to monumental columned temple-complexes, God had a residence.
Most of the temples known today date from the New Kingdom through the Ptolemaic period of Egyptian history. Edfu was dedicated primarily to God as Heru, Dendera was dedicated to God as Hethert, Karnak was dedicated primarily to God as Amun.
God as Aset is known from the Pyramid Texts, the oldest religious literature in the world. Aset was worshipped in many places throughout Egypt. She was known in the Delta and in Nubia. Her most well-known temple is that of Philae. However, Aset was worshipped in chapels, shrines, and temples from Abydos to Karnak to Kusae.
One temple dedicated to God as Aset
is located near Behbeit el-Hagar in the central Delta. By the village of Behbeit el-Hagara, in the
Central Delta north of Samannud, once ancient Sebennytos, which was capital of the 12th
Nome of Lower Egypt, lies the ruins of a temple now known to be primarily
dedicated to the Egyptian deity Isis, or as She was better called in the time of
pre-Hellenic Kemet, Aset.
The temple at Behbeit el-Hagar dedicated to the Divine Name of Aset and to Her Divine Husband Wesir and their Divine Son Heru, was built by Nectanebo II, last Egyptian King of the 30th Dynasty, and thus predates the Graeco-Roman temple to Isis at Philae.
Because it is a more truly Egyptian temple, it will serve herein as the Place of Learning and Adoration for the Great Aset, the divine sister-wife to Wesir, mother of Heru, sister to Set and Nebt-Het, daughter to Geb and Nut, She Who stands at the prow of the Sun barque of Ra as It sails through the sky, She Who is Great of Magic.
Name
of the site
The Arabic name of Behbeit derives from the
Kemetic Per-hebite(t) or “Domain of the Festive goddess.” It has been
linked with the Iseion and the ruins in Busiris as described by Herodotus and
other classical writers. The other name of this site was “the place where
offerings are set down” as said in the Mythological Delta Papyrus of the Third
Intermediate Period.
The temple itself is named Hebit and
is a type of Festival Hall or Pavilion, New Kingdom and later temples, hebit
being an abbreviated form of wesekhet hebit, the “festival hall.” The
hebit was any type of dwelling-place for funerary or divine statues,
where they partake of festal offerings brought to the temple by the people of
the region as well as those made within the temple complex. The Festival Hall
was the place where the funerary world meets the divine, especially at holy
feasts; for example, some Egyptians were privileged to set up their private
statues along with the divine images, in order to benefit in the feast offerings
made to the gods.
Behbeit was a place where the Osirian triad,
that is, Osiris/Wsir, Isis/Ast, and Horus/Hru, was worshipped. It also was a
place where the cultural activities of Isis and Horus are dedicated to
Osiris-Andjety. The main cultural activities of the temple thus concern the
fabrication of a clay statue of Osiris Khenty-imentet, supporting His rebirth by
the rite of setting offerings down.
History of the site
There are external sources that indicate the
earliest mention of Per-hebitet, or Hebit, was no earlier than in
the reign of Amenhotep III. Nectanebo II, (360-343 BCE), Ptolemy II, and III
worked on building the temple. An earlier construction was undertaken by the
last Saite kings, a cult of their statues being attested there. Perhaps before
the Nectanebo’s permanent construction, it was a place for festival offerings
to the statue of Osiris, guaranteeing the king’s rebirth. Inscriptions on a
statue of Harsiesis, vizier of Nectanebo II, indicates that some work was
carried out to create a watery link between Behbeit and the Busirite nome in the
30th Dynasty, possibly indicating that the temple was planned then
though not yet begun. In addition on this statue, Nectanebo I is said to be
“beloved of Osiris-Hemag, the great god which lives in Behbeit.”
Although nearby Sebennytos benefited from the building activities of Philip Arrhidaeus and Alexander IV, while Ptolemy I was a mere satrap, the temple site shows no other traces of Persian or Macedonian presence. Ptolemy II, 284-246 BCE, completed the most important part of the temple, though it is as yet unclear whether he modified the architecture or only had the existing walls decorated and inscribed. Ptolemy III, 246-222 BCE, probably enlarged the sanctuary by adding a columned hall and façade. By the reign of the Roman emperor Domitian, the temple had collapsed into ruins.
Desc
The dromos was edged with the sphinxes of
Nectanebo II. At the main entrance, the left wing, from the ground to the top,
one Nile procession, a line of dedicatory inscription, two or maybe three
registers of seated gods, another dedicatory inscription, and Hathor head
frieze, alternating with the two cartouches of Ptolemy III and Berenike II. On
the right wing, dedicatory inscriptions indicate that the left wing was built by
Ptolemy III for his father Osiris-Andjety, and the right wing by Berenike II for
her mother Isis.
The iconography of the façade gives Osiris
preeminence. The king makes offering to three aspects of the god, with Isis on
the left wing sitting behind him. On the right wing, Harsiesis (Horus son of
Osiris) follows Osiris.
Richard Pococke described the location in his book A Description of the East and Some other Countries, Vol. I. published in 1743. He said in part: "...A large temple dedicated to Isis, there being great remains of a temple here, the most costly in its materials of any in Egypt: it is built of granite, and appears by the hieroglyphics and capitals of the pillars to have been a temple of Isis....it seem'd to have been about two hundred feet long, and hundred feet broad, for it is all a confused heap of reuins. At about one hundred feet distance is a mound raised round it, as to keep out the Nile, with an entrance on each side; the walls of the temple seem to have been ten feet thick, and to be built on the outside with grey granite....the Inside was built of fine red granite...what commanded our attention still more, was the exquisite sculpture of the hieroglyphics; and tho' the figures, about four feet high, was the exquisite Egyptian taste, yet there is something so fine, so divine, in a manner, in the mein of the deities and priests, that it far exceeds ay thing I ever saw in this way."
Sir Gardner Wilkinson described the location in his Modern Egypt and Thebes: A description of Egypt, published in 1843. He wrote in part: "Bebayt...has the merit of possessing rich and elaborate sculptures; and to the antiquary is particularly interesting, from its presenting the name of the deity worshipped there, and that of the ancient town. Isis was evidently the divinity of this city....The temple, like many others in Egypt, stood in an extensive square about 1500 by 1000 feet, surrounded by a crude brick wall, doubtless with stone gateways. This was the sacred enclosure, and was planed with trees, as Herodotus informs us in describing that of Bubastis... The temple itself was about 400 feet long, or 600 to the outer vestibule, by about 200 in breadth, and built of granite, some red ,some grey, of a very beautiful quality, and covered with sculptures, in intaglio and in relief....The principal deities are Isis, the deity of the place, who has always the title "Lady of Hebai-t;" Osiris, who frequently accompanies her, and is generally called "Lord of Hebai-t;" Anubis, Sobek, and some others....
The sanctuary of Isis
At the façade of the sanctuary of Isis, the various scenes display Isis and kingship. The king is introduced to Isis by Horus of Behdet, Nekhbet, and possibly Rayt. Isis warrants inheritance of the throne of Egypt, and on the upper register guarantees domination over foreign countries. Each of Ptolemy II’s cartouches is associated with one dedicated to Isis the great, the divine mother.
Between these two wings, a huge lintel is
decorated with the winged disc, showing the entrance to the sacred place of
Isis, and in the dedication of the façade, says, “This
is the akhet-horizon of the queen of the gods, the venerable djerit-sanctuary of
the Lady of Inheritance, the heret-sky of the divine female falcon.”
Isis is described as the "image of Atum" on the south wall in a barque inscription, and in a hymn to Isis, extremely fragmentary, but the earliest known so far, praises and jubilations are addressed to the deity, while worshippers bow to the ground for Her "ka in peace like Atum when he sets (in the horizon.) She is further described as "Isis the great, the divine mother, the mistress of Hebyt rests inside her bark as Atum when he sets in the Western horizon."
Though Isis only shares this sacred space with her son Horus who receives the crowns of Upper and Lower Egypt, thus justifying her "son" Horus-Ptolemy II's legitimacy over Egypt, she is also described in the main scene of the south wall as being the proctress of "the Great Prince, Osiris-Onophris triumphant."
In the south-west chapel, one of several, Isis once again takes central place, as she is described as "shining like Ra, the [divine] falcon illuminating...."
Return to Temples Dedicated to Aset
Textual material from "The Temple of Behbeit el-Hagara" by Christine Favard-Meeks in The Temple in Ancient Egypt edited by Stephen Quirke.